Glass Half Full

My most recent post was a contribution to the New Albany Schools website.  You may access it here.

There are a lot of awesome people at New Albany High School.  A single person can have a huge impact on school culture.  In this blog post, I introduce a just a few of these awesome Eagles. 

KNOW YOUR STUDENTS' STORIES

How well do you know your students?  I mean really know them?  

Knowing your students stories is deeper than giving a survey to find out about their background experiences and favorite food or how they like to learn best.  You really know a student when you can tell me their hopes, dreams, struggles, fears, passions, and purpose. 

Here are three reasons why really knowing them is not just important – but imperative if you want to consider yourself a great educator.

1.  Helps to develop empathy in the teacher

Empathy allows us to put ourselves in someone else’s shoes.  It is key in creating trust between individuals leading to a stable and healthy relationship.  It enables an educator to peel away from their professional costume and remember what it is to be human.  By knowing a student’s story – you are creating empathy within yourself toward that student. 

2. Enables the teacher to be aware of student growth and success

If you are a teacher, you are a leader.  One of the things great leaders do is celebrate their teams’ growth and successes.  By knowing your students stories, you can celebrate growth.  The celebration can be as simple as writing a note to a student for maintaining positive class participation even while her grandmother had been in the hospital for the past few weeks.

      3.  Aligns with OTES rubric

The OTES rubic is one of our measuring sticks for teacher quality.  It would make sense then that knowing our students’ stories is a part of this rubric.  Use what you know about their stories to help you create a better environment for your students to learn. 

In the OTES (Ohio Teacher Evaluation System), under the Instructional Planning thread is Standard 1: Knowledge of Students.  According to ODE, an accomplished teacher will:

·         Demonstrate an understanding of the purpose and value of learning about students’ background experiences

·         Demonstrate familiarity with each student’s background knowledge and experiences

·         Describe multiple procedures used to obtain this information. 

·         The teacher should use this data to guide their instructional strategies, plans, and content delivery so that the needs of all students and groups of students are met

New Albany High School's New Learning Environments

My most recent blog post is another contribution to Mr. Carter's Office.  This post is about New Albany High School's new learning environments.  The post can be viewed here.  The purpose of this post is to inform parents and community members how New Albany High School is attempting to meet the needs of all learners.

Social Media Apps

My latest blog post was contributed to Mr. Carter's Office Blog and can be viewed by clicking here.

My goal was to share current and upcoming social media apps with parents and encourage them to have the appropriate conversations with their middle/high school student.  After it was posted, I received positive feedback from many parents.  Interestingly, one parent of two elementary children commented that she has experienced many these apps being explored with her 5th grade son.  It is never too early to open the dialogue with your student.

The FRED Factor

I just read the inspiring and uplifting book, The Fred Factor, by Mark Sanborn.  I highly recommend it.  You can read it in about 2 hours - very quick read and lots of little nuggets to take away. 

I would like to share a "Fred" in my life.  In January of 2002, I started my first day of student teaching at Gahanna-Lincoln High School.  I graduated high school in a class of 120 and went to a small university with an on-campus population of just a few thousand.  So I was just a bit intimidated walking into a high school of over 2,300 students.

Because I arrived during bus drop off, I was forced to park in the back lot - which meant I entered the building somewhere in the back.  As I entered the building, I was reminded of the crowd from a recent concert I attended.  It was not chaotic, just crowded and busy.

I saw an adult and asked him how to get to the front office. He started to explain, "go down this hallway, turn right, go past the cafeteria, turn, left after the restrooms, go through the lobby..." He must have seen the gazed look in my eyes because he stopped in the middle of his explanation and said, "you know what, just follow me. I will take you there." 

The Fred Factor is all about finding those small opportunities to make a big difference in the life of someone else. 

Thank you Chuck Banks (@TheRealMrBanks) for being exceptional and extraordinary by walking me to the front office and engaging me in a comfortable conversation on that day. 

Find your opportunity to be a "Fred" to someone else today!